The tiny team trying to keep AI from destroying everything

Decoder with Nilay Patel

Vox Media Podcast Network

Technology, Business

4.3 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 4 December 2025

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Today, I’m talking with Verge senior AI reporter Hayden Field about some of the people responsible for studying AI and deciding in what ways it might… well, ruin the world. Those folks work at Anthropic as part of a group called the societal impacts team, which Hayden just spent time with for a profile she published this week on The Verge. The team is just nine people out of more than 2,000 who work at Anthropic, and their only job, as the team members themselves say, is to investigate and publish quote "inconvenient truths” about AI. That of course brings up a whole host of problems, the most important of which is whether this team can remain independent, or even exist at all, as it publicizes findings about Anthropic's own products that might be unflattering or even politically fraught. Links: It’s their job to keep AI from destroying everything | The Verge Anthropic details how it measures Claude’s wokeness | The Verge White House orders tech companies to make AI bigoted again | The Verge Chaos and lies: Why Sam Altman was booted from OpenAI | The Verge How Elon Musk Is remaking Grok in his image | NYT Anthropic tries to defuse White House backlash | Axios New AI battle: White House vs. Anthropic | Axios Anthropic will pursue gulf state investments after all | Wired Subscribe to The Verge to access the ad-free version of Decoder! Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Decoder is produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and edited by Ursa Wright. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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1:34.0	Hello and welcome to Dakota. I'm Nealai Patel, editor-in-chief of the Verge, and Dakota is my show about big ideas and other problems.
1:40.5	Today I'm talking with Verge senior AI Reporter Hayden Field about some of the people responsible
1:44.5	for studying AI and deciding in what ways it might, well, ruin the world.
1:49.7	Those folks work at Anthropic is part of its societal impacts team, and Hayden just spent
1:53.8	some time with them for a profile she published this week.
1:57.0	It's just nine people out of more than 2,000 who work at Anthropic, and their only job,
2:01.6	as the team members themselves say, is to investigate and publish, quote, inconvenient
2:06.6	truths about how people are using AI tools, what chatbots might be doing to our mental health,
2:11.6	and how all of that might be having broader ripple effects on the labor market, the economy, and even our elections.
2:20.6	Of course, that kind of work brings with it a whole host of problems.
	...

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